


the kindness of strangers

by spikeface



Category: Star Trek: Alternate Original Series (Movies)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-02-25
Updated: 2013-02-25
Packaged: 2017-12-03 14:02:05
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,495
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/699033
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/spikeface/pseuds/spikeface
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>For <a href="http://community.livejournal.com/issenterprise/2144.html?thread=44896#t44896">this prompt</a>: <i>It's an unspoken fact among the Mirror!Crew that the only one who can pull Mirror!Kirk back from going too far is Mirror!McCoy, so...  5 times a crew member went to Mirror!McCoy and begged him to save them from Mirror!Kirk.</i></p>
            </blockquote>





	the kindness of strangers

_1\. Chapel_

McCoy usually gets a little warning when Kirk is going to drop by, which means he has a chance to tell Chapel to leave. But either he missed the message or Kirk has decided to fuck with him, because McCoy walks out of his office and finds him centimeters away from Chapel’s face.

“I’m afraid I can’t help you with that, Captain,” Chapel is saying calmly.

McCoy has never wished that he had a nurse whose hands shook, but that’s exactly what he wants right now. If Chapel just looked a little scared Kirk would back off, he’s sure of it, but of course she stands straight and all but dares him to fuck with her. McCoy knows she’s quivering on the inside, because that’s what everyone does under the Kirk microscope, but because she doesn’t have the sense god gave a dog she won’t let it show.

Finally, _finally_ , she breaks a bit, noticing McCoy on the other side of Sickbay. She doesn’t move, but he can see as she looks at him that she’s afraid, and angry about it. And if he can see it, Kirk definitely can.

Kirk turns to him and smiles slowly. “Why, hello, doctor. Maybe you’ve got the information I want?”

McCoy has no idea what he’s referring to, but Kirk’s smile implies they won’t be doing a lot of talking. Chapel is still looking at him. She’s trying for calm, but they both know what Kirk likes to do to tall, blonde, authoritative women.

“Yeah, I’ve got what you want.” This is what Kirk is here for anyway.

Kirk grins triumphantly as he gestures for McCoy to follow him. McCoy signals to Chapel that she should scram, but she doesn’t move, looking dazed as she watches him leave Sickbay.

Three days later they’re alone doing inventory and Chapel is glaring at him. “ _What_?”

“You didn’t have to do that.”

He immediately knows what she’s talking about, and it’s not a conversation he wants to have. Chapel is his best nurse and loyal besides, and that’s really not a conversation he wants to have. He gets in her face. “You don’t ever bring that up again. Understand?”

She narrows her eyes.

“Ever,” he insists flatly.

There’s a tense moment when he wonders if she’ll reach for her knife, but then she nods and looks away.

_2\. Chekov_

Seeing Chekov run into Sickbay isn’t all that strange. The kid has a habit of scrambling all over the ship like a crazy Russian bunny, so McCoy just raises an eyebrow when he skids to a stop in front of him. But then he starts babbling in the mother tongue.

“Do I look like a goddamn communications officer? Standard or nothing, Ensign.”

Chekov actually blushes. “Sorry, sorry, doctor. I am in a hurry. There is only a little time before Kirk’s guards find me.”

And he thought he’d run here? McCoy looks to see if he’s got a knife or a phaser. The last thing he needs to be is a hostage. But Chekov is unarmed. “So what do you want me to do about it?”

“Kirk will put me in the agony booth. I am prepared for this. But I have calculated the effect that the booth will have and have determined that any period longer than 2.37 hours will result in lethal harm. I need you to convince him not to allow me to remain in the booth for longer than that period. I will make it very worth your while.” He says it in a rush, and then watches McCoy’s reaction with wide eyes.

McCoy is mostly just confused. “Why’s he going to put you in the booth?”

Chekov blinks, apparently expecting a different question. “Because I tried to kill him.”

“So why the hell should I save you?”

“Because –” Chekov pauses, licks his lips, glances hurriedly at the door like Kirk’s guards will bust in any moment. “I tried to kill him. But I did not succeed. I do not deserve to die if I have not killed anyone.”

Privately McCoy agrees, but he wonders drily if Chekov would still think that if it wasn’t his neck on the line. He’s still figuring out an answer when two burly looking security officers barge in and grab Chekov. Instead of struggling he stares at McCoy, shamelessly pleading. “Just name your terms, doctor.”

McCoy can only shrug. “If Kirk wants you dead, you’ll die.”

That should be the end of it, but two hours and ten minutes later he finds himself in the booth room. He’s hoping to find it empty, but there’s Kirk, watching unblinkingly as Chekov writhes. He gets the feeling that Kirk’s pants are pretty tight on him at the moment. Except Kirk never gets off on killing people, which is why if he wants them dead they usually just disappear in a green light. If Chekov dies, McCoy is willing to bet Kirk will consider it a miscalculation on his part and sulk up a storm.

“It looks like he’s learned his lesson.”

Kirk doesn’t turn. “Oh, I’m sure he has.”

“He won’t last much longer, young as he is.” When Kirk does nothing, he presses. “You’ll kill him if you don’t let him out.”

Now Kirk considers him. “Why do you care?”

McCoy shuffles with unease that’s not entirely feigned. “He’s the best navigator in Starfleet. I don’t want second best flying this rust bucket.” Which is the truth, although not really why he’s here. Aviophobia is just an easier weakness to share, with much more predictable consequences.

As always, Kirk pounces. “You willing to take him off my mind?”

Kirk’s probably horny enough at this point to fuck Keenser, so it won’t take much. “I could be convinced.”

Kirk smiles, and then turns to the guard next to the booth. “Let him out.”

Hours later, when McCoy is nursing sore spots in his office, Chekov finds him. He’s walking this time, and slowly. “Doctor.”

McCoy nods, not exactly eager to tax his throat with talking.

“You did not name your terms.”

McCoy is tired and uncomfortable and absolutely not in the mood to fuck with some kid who looks like hell. “Just fuck off,” he croaks.

“But doctor—”

“I said fuck off! Are you deaf or just stupid?”

Chekov has proven himself a daring man to try to kill the Captain, but even he clearly knows better than to bother McCoy when he uses that tone. He slinks away, and doesn’t even look at him when McCoy has occasion to be on the bridge.

_3\. Sulu_

As head of the apes who call them selves Security Sulu has always been persona non grata in Sickbay, and McCoy has never hesitated to let him know. Sulu seems to get that and has always kept his distance, which makes his appearance in McCoy’s office all the more surprising.

“What the hell do you want?” Sulu is a viper of a man, so McCoy finds it best to play things straight with him.

Sulu’s hair is mussed out of its usual smoothness, but he’s got his trademark Mona Lisa smile when he opens his mouth. “I need a favor.”

“I’m busy.” He’s got a virus ripping through Security that’s driving him crazy. It’s non lethal and very curable but it spreads like wildfire and it seems like every security officer on the ship has to be forced into Sickbay at phaser-point. It’s also obviously bio-engineered, which offers a whole different problem to deal with.

“I know.”

“So you know I’m not in the mood for your crap. Unless you want to help me round up patients or figure out who made this fucker you can go throw yourself out an airlock.”

Sulu rolls his eyes. “I know because I made it, doctor.”

That stops McCoy cold. “You little shit. Do you have any idea the amount of vomit I’ve had to deal with in the past three days because of you?”

Sulu shifts his weight slightly. “It was only supposed to hit Officer Johns.”

“Yeah, well, it didn’t,” McCoy snaps. But then, when he can’t hold back his curiosity, “Why him?”

Sulu’s voice is cold, his usually calm face twisted. “He touched something that belongs to me.”

McCoy suddenly recalls that Uhura recently threatened him with castration when he offered to treat a set of bruises on her arms. McCoy’s not stupid enough to think Sulu is some kind of white knight, but in this case his violent and possessive tendencies match McCoy’s own feelings on the matter. “What do you want?”

“Kirk knows I planted it.”

“And?”

“He’s not exactly pleased.”

McCoy has a vague idea where this is going, but he can’t see how he could convince Kirk not to punish Sulu for making such a mess of things. “What do you want me to do about it?"

Sulu seems to calm at that, and his voice is once more casual and dangerous. “You know, in ancient times gods who were responsible for healing were also feared as bringers of disease.”

It’s shockingly roundabout for a man who throws himself at Romulans, so it takes McCoy a minute to figure out what this arrogant fucker is asking for. “You want me to say I did it?”

“He wouldn’t punish you for it.” There’s a pointed silence where Sulu doesn’t add, “Not more than he does already.”

McCoy wants to punch his face in. “Easy for you to say.”

Sulu holds up his hands and smiles. “It’s just a suggestion, doctor. One I’d be very ready to repay you for.”

The sly smile, soothing tone and obvious subtext is starting to give him a headache. He’s a doctor, not a goddamn politician. “Leave me out of your games.”

Sulu goes, still smiling, and it’s possible that he’s the smuggest bastard that ever lived. And fuck McCoy if he’s not one of the smartest, too, because like clockwork McCoy is knocking on Kirk’s door four hours later. It swishes open at Kirk’s command and McCoy finds him standing in the middle of his ready room next to Sulu, who’s kneeling and looking a little worse for the wear.

“Just in time,” Kirk says, looking pleased. “I could use another opinion. Which eye do you think I should take? I was thinking right but the left might work better with the scar.”

If he winds up with a ruined eye to fix after this he’s going to fuck Sulu six ways from Sunday. “Any reason in particular you’re fixing to take one?”

Kirk’s eyes narrow. “Playing dumb isn’t a good look on you, McCoy. You know what he’s done.” He turns back to Sulu. “Can’t have my best pilot stepping out of bounds, now can I?”

“How about your CMO?” McCoy asks as he walks closer.

As realization hits Kirk shifts to that dangerous expression McCoy has come to associate with long nights and painful orgasms. “You saying you did this?”

This is the hardest part to sell. He can’t use the Johns excuse, because if he was going to hit someone with a disease he’d damn well make sure they were the only victim. He sticks to the truth. “I don’t like Security.”

Kirk arches an eyebrow. “And you were going to let Sulu take the blame?”

“I don’t like Security,” he repeats. Sulu has the sense to look livid.

“That was naughty of you,” Kirk says as he gestures for Sulu to get up. Sulu rises gracefully and inspects his few shallow wounds as Kirk snaps his fingers for McCoy to kneel. McCoy goes to his knees and stares at the carpet, but he can hear Sulu leaving.

“You weren’t dismissed, Lieutenant.”

Sulu stops. “Sir?”

He can hear the smile in Kirk’s voice. “You can watch.”

McCoy swallows his dread at the thought of an audience. He has to admire it: in one neat move Kirk apologizes for blaming Sulu and makes McCoy’s ensuing punishment that much worse. Then Kirk’s hands are on him, and he can’t afford to think about that more.

Kirk doesn’t wind up taking an eye, but he leaves McCoy more than enough to complain about. 

He thanks heaven for small mercies when Sulu pointedly avoids him afterward, but two weeks later he gets a message: _I’ve got an Ireli vine whose pollen induces erectile dysfunction. Interested?_

McCoy scowls at the computer like he can delete the message through force of will. _NO. And I know who to blame if someone winds up with limp dick_ , he sends back. 

Sulu never replies and Kirk remains as aggressively virile as ever. McCoy wonders a little ruefully why he did it at all.

_4\. Uhura_

McCoy wasn’t there to witness it, but by now everyone on the ship has heard about Uhura publicly refusing Kirk. McCoy doesn’t know the details but he’s familiar enough with both the players to assume that it didn’t go over well, so he’s not surprised when Uhura shows up in Sickbay with a split lip and a murderous expression.

Like a lot of women in Starfleet Uhura is extremely wary about being touched, even in a medical capacity, so McCoy is careful not to antagonize her. He goes for the disinfectant and regenerator without comment. 

He’s sure Uhura will leave as soon as he’s done, but she doesn’t. “Have you ever told him no?”

He tries not to read fear in her voice, or show his own. “I tried, once.”

“How’d it go?”

“Not well.” The memory tries to rear up, but he locks it away.

Uhura’s lips quirk. “And he likes you.”

He laughs bitterly.

“It’s true.”

It’s not worth arguing over. “For all the good it does me.”

Now Uhura just looks incredulous. “You’re the only who has any control over him.” At his blank look she continues, “You’re the only one who can stop him from doing something he’ll regret.”

Bullshit. Kirk has never done anything he doesn’t want to. He just lets McCoy convince him to be distracted because it suits him. But McCoy gets the feeling that’s not what Uhura wants to hear. “You going somewhere with this?”

Her silence is answer enough.

“Get out.”

She doesn’t move.

“Now.” He glares.

Uhura shrugs with well-feigned nonchalance and turns to go. “Think about it, doctor.”

And goddammit, he does. He’s not sure why. Uhura isn’t anything to him – not a daughter, not a wife, not even a friend. But he can’t stop thinking about it, and the headache it gives him is apparently enough to drive him to Kirk’s quarters. Even though it’s stupid. Even though there’s a good chance there’s nothing to be done and a lot that could go wrong if he tries.

Kirk lets him, like always. McCoy steps into his ready room like a fly into the goddamn parlor and finds pretty much what he expected. It’s the only way Kirk is anything like predictable.

Uhura studiously doesn’t look at him from where she’s on all fours on the floor. Spock, kneeling naked behind her and possessively gripping on her hips, regards him with less than his usual stoicism. McCoy wonders how long he’s been waiting to get his green-blooded hands on her. Would he accept McCoy as a substitute? McCoy has probably annoyed him enough times to warrant a punishing fuck or three.

The real question is Kirk, who is kneeling in front of Uhura and looking extremely pleased with himself. “Here to join us?” His grin is radiant. “You can have her mouth when I’m finished.”

“No, thanks.”

“I wasn’t asking.”

“I know.”

“Why, you want to take her place instead?” Kirk’s tone is joking, but McCoy knows him well enough to hear the threat in it.

Like Uhura earlier he lets the silence answer.

The smile fades from Kirk’s face, and he seems genuinely perplexed. “That’s what you want?”

McCoy looks at Uhura, on her knees and splayed out like the whore she’s always refused to be. He looks at Spock and tries not to think about everything he’s read about Vulcan strength and stamina. “Yeah, I think so.” His voice shakes only a little.

“Why?”

Isn’t that the goddamn question. McCoy can only shrug.

“You like her?”

“Not especially.”

He waits, and is rewarded as Kirk’s disbelief shifts into the hungry thing that emerges whenever he finds McCoy angry, uncomfortable, or just confused. Right now he’s all three.

Finally Kirk laughs. “What is it with you and girls? Fuck. All right. It’s your lucky fucking day, Uhura.”

She’s up like a shot and dressed in under thirty seconds. She waits until Kirk nods for her to leave, but then she’s gone without even a look his way. McCoy watches her go and kicks himself for being a sentimental idiot.

Kirk cocks his head curiously as McCoy strips. “You know, McCoy, sometimes I don’t get you at all.”

“I don’t get me either,” McCoy admits as he slowly gets down on all fours. He tries not to flinch as he feels hot hands on his hips. He can tell just from the grip that Spock is going to make him regret this. As if he’s not regretting it already.

Kirk kneels in front of him and winds cruel fingers in his hair. “Now,” he says as he draws McCoy’s face to his cock. “Where were we?”

Afterwards he practically dives into the shower and scrubs his skin until it’s raw. All he wants to do is lock himself in his room until the mission is over, but that’s a luxury he can’t afford. He settles for holing up in his office with a lot of PADDs and the resolution to make anyone who comes into his office cry.

Unfortunately the only person who comes to see him is Uhura, who’d swallow acid before she shed a tear. She stands on the other side of his desk and looks beautiful and angry and young. Very, very young. “We never worked out the details of what you wanted from me.”

McCoy doesn’t say anything. He knows what Uhura thinks he wants; there are only so many things a beautiful woman is expected to offer as payment, no matter how brilliant she is. Refusing is an insult, since it will imply he finds her worthless, and trying to explain why he actually did what he did will only get him laughed at.

Not that he’s really sure, anymore.

“McCoy.”

“I don’t want anything,” McCoy says, knowing it sounds self-pitying and not really caring. 

“People would give their right arm for me,” Uhura warns. 

He knows he should back down, but fuck it. Everyone on this damn ship seems determined to make him put a price on his dignity, and he’s had enough. “I’m not fucking interested, okay?”

There’s a moment of silence before Uhura’s gimlet eyes don’t soften, but she stops looking pissed off. “Fine.”

He listens to the clack of her heels recede with something like relief.

_5\. Spock_

He forces himself not to jump when he turns around and suddenly Spock is in the middle of Sickbay. They’ve been avoiding each other since the incident, to McCoy’s extreme and hidden relief, and at first he thinks there must be a crisis on the bridge for Spock to come down here. But then he gets a good look at him. “You here for a physical?”

“I am… not certain.”

“Well, you need one. You look like hell.”

“That is unlikely, doctor,” Spock says, but it lacks his usual crispness. McCoy hurries him to the exam room.

The readings make him pale. He hasn’t had to deliver this kind of diagnosis in a long time, and the memory isn’t one he’s itching to recall.

Thank heaven for small mercies, Spock spares him. “Your diagnosis is unnecessary.”

“You know you’re dying?”

“I am aware.”

“You know why?”

“I do.”

McCoy rolls his eyes and prays for the patience to deal with Vulcan assholes. “Care to share?”

“It is not something to be discussed with offworlders. I must report to New Vulcan.”

“Have you told Kirk this?”

“I have. He is determined to go to Altair VI for the treaty.”

“Does _he_ know you’re dying?”

“He is aware. It did not affect his decision.”

“So that’s it?” He’s never seen Spock so despondent. He looks like an old man with an incurable disease.

“Kirk has refused to be convinced to go to New Vulcan, so there is nothing to be done. It is…” McCoy knows what Spock will say because he’s heard it before. Said it before. “It is only a matter of time.”

McCoy should feel good about this. He still has the occasional nightmare about Spock’s hands on him, and they were hardly friends before that. Spock is Kirk’s best officer, and McCoy doubts Kirk wants to lose him, but that doesn’t mean it’s any of McCoy’s business. Kirk is going to be pissed when Spock dies, which is always bad news, but he can’t imagine it would be worse than what he’d have to do get him to show up late for the treaty.

And still somehow he finds himself at Kirk’s door, almost as unaware of his surroundings as Spock until Kirk lets him in.

“Spock is dying.”

“I know.” Kirk is studying a PADD.

“He needs to go to New Vulcan.”

“So he said.”

“ _Kirk_.”

He looks up, scowling. “What?”

“He’s your best officer and you know it. Are you really going to lose him over an appearance for a treaty?”

“What’s it to you? Can’t bear to give up Vulcan dick now that you’ve gotten a taste?”

That’s a low fucking blow. McCoy swallows bile. “Kirk.”

Kirk huffs. “We’re expected on Altair VI. They’re not about to move the treaty and the Enterprise is ‘an important symbol of the empire.’” Kirk includes sarcastic air quotes.

“You’d be one of three ships there. It’s not necessary and you know it. It’s definitely not worth the loss you’d take if we don’t go.”

Kirk turns back to his PADD for so long that McCoy starts to think he’s been dismissed. But then Kirk says, “Look, I don’t give a shit.” He turns back to McCoy. “It’s placating the council on Altair VI when we finally get there that’s the problem. You ready to do that?”

One step at a time. “Yes.” He stumbles over the word.

Kirk looks at him like he’s grown another head. “You’d really choose a _gangbang_ over losing Spock?”

He knows it’s crazy. He hates Spock, and Spock hasn’t even asked for his help. It’s none of his business. But really, it doesn’t have anything to do with Spock, even if he still hears Spock’s voice echoing in his head: _it’s only a matter of time_. “Looks that way.”

Kirk squints at him, his smile rueful. “You’re the craziest man I know, McCoy.”

McCoy gets on his knees. “You need to get out more.”

Kirk breathes a laugh, and then says more seriously, “I won’t always give you a choice. You know that, right?”

It’s in every one of his nightmares. “I know.”

Two days later Spock is back to normal, Kirk has made his appearance, and McCoy has thoroughly and painfully appeased every smarting ego on the council. There’s no permanent damage, but most of it is beyond the scope of a regenerator. McCoy showers for an age and vomits twice before curling up in his room with a bottle of brandy and the resolve to drown as many memories as he can.

He’s doing pretty well when Spock shows up at his door. McCoy has already stood and told it to open before he remembers that he doesn’t want company. By then it’s too late, and Spock is standing awkwardly at his threshold.

They stare at each other.

Spock steps into the room, allowing the door to shut behind him, but he makes no move beyond that. McCoy feels like he’s trapped in molasses, all his senses blessedly dulled by alcohol. 

“Captain Kirk informed me that you took responsibility for ensuring that none of the council took punitive measures against the Enterprise for the delay.”

As good a way to put it as any.

Spock’s eyes travel up and down McCoy’s body and McCoy immediately wants to take another shower, even though there’s nothing sexual about the inspection. “I see the council was very displeased.”

McCoy crosses his arms, putting pressure on bruises and rope burns and welts. “What do you want?”

“I wished to inform you that I consider your actions a personal favor. I will repay in any way you deem necessary.”

McCoy doesn’t know why he expected anything different. He doesn’t even know what he wanted to hear, only that this isn’t it. “Just go away.”

Spock blinks. “It is illogical to do a favor without expecting something in return.”

McCoy ignores him in favor of turning and heading back to his couch and his bourbon. When he turns back Spock is gone.

_+1 Himself_

Kaeli is just an average class M imperial planet whose revenue is down, and squeezing what they can out of them is the kind of milk run mission the Enterprise gets stuck with when interplanetary crises are slow. McCoy almost never has anything to do with them, since he’s not in charge of communications, diplomacy, or blasting the ever-loving shit out of doomed cities. He sits down for the briefing and wonders why the hell he’s even here.

He had never really expected to get over Altair VI, and so far he hasn’t. His work hasn’t suffered, but everything else has gone a little blurry. Food, bland to begin with when it’s from the synthesizer, is just mush in his mouth. He doesn’t sleep, and when he does he never feels rested afterwards. He lets the nurses handle the day-to-day cases, because he can’t be bothered to talk to anyone. He stops eating in mess, unable to bear the noise and press of bodies.

Kirk can snap him out of it when he’s of a mind. McCoy accepted a while ago that Kirk can do whatever he wants, as much as McCoy hates it. Nights with him – or days, the occasional couple of hours, sometimes just minutes – are bright and memorable.

But they don’t help, really. Half the time he looks up from whatever humiliating position Kirk has ordered him into and Kirk is just frowning at him, like McCoy is an equation he’s yet to solve. It’s weird, because from the first Kirk has known him frighteningly well, and he wonders what he’s turning into that Kirk doesn’t recognize him.

“You look like crap,” Kirk notes one day when he’s sated and sprawled in his chair and McCoy is exhausted at his feet.

“Doesn’t seem to have slowed you down,” McCoy says he catches his breath. He gets to his feet slowly and goes to raid Kirk’s store of brandy. Kirk frowns but doesn’t say anything, so McCoy pours glasses for both of them.

Kirk takes a sip but doesn’t stop trying to crack McCoy open with his eyes. “Y’know, McCoy, I’ve got to admit, I’ve known you for five years now and sometimes I still can’t figure out what the hell you want.”

McCoy drinks his brandy. What does he want? A shower. A good night’s sleep. A break. He wants to work with people who don’t fucking stab each other for no reason. He wants to not feel dirty and tired and empty all the time. He wants to sip mint juleps and lie in the grass with the sun on his face. He wants to sit on his porch in Georgia with a wife who loves him and a daughter who knows him and look up at stars and planets that do nothing more than twinkle in the sky. 

Christ, he’s tired.

He can never go back, he reminds himself. Everything he thought of as home has been gone for a long time; it’s the reason he joined this nightmare in the first place. But for one brief moment he indulges himself, letting himself imagine what it would be like to wake up in a proper bed and eat real food with a real family and feel a planet – a _home_ \-- under his feet instead of a floating death trap.

When he finally looks up again Kirk is still considering him, predatory and discerning. McCoy holds up his empty glass. “All I want is a refill.”

Kirk takes a slow sip of his own drink, unblinking as he takes in every aspect of McCoy’s cracked façade. Then he waves towards the brandy, his generosity as casual as his brutality.

He lets McCoy leave after that, and hasn’t brought it up since.

Nobody bothers him anymore, at least. Chapel seems to have figured out the best way to keep off Kirk’s radar and avoids him completely when they’re off-shift. Chekov and Sulu barely look at him, and Uhura and Spock only regard him with cool professionalism. As he sits down for the briefing none of them even glance his way. He’s sure they’re all placing bets behind his back on when he’ll crack, but at least he doesn’t have to hear it.

“This is Kaeli,” Kirk announces, showing them a series of data and images. Kaeli is blue and green from the distance of orbit, and close ups show everything from purple mountain majesties to amber fucking waves of grain.

“The cause of the lack of revenue has been determined to be a planet-wide plague,” Kirk continues, flipping through images until he ends on one showing Kaeli’s most valuable product: grain. “Starfleet Medical has declared that its curability is within the scope of Kaelian technology, so our mission is to convince the Kaelians that they need to focus and step it up a little. I’ve given them two weeks to cure the plague and deliver their owed revenue, or they’ll lose their capital.” 

McCoy doesn’t even bother to point out that Starfleet Medical is mostly staffed by bored sadists. Starfleet’s bridge burning policy when it comes to interplanetary aid is one of their stupidest, but McCoy is too tired to argue. He focuses on the slide and waits for the meeting to be over. 

As he waits, he can’t help but be struck by how closely Kaelian grain resembles Terran specimens. Memories gang up on him, melting into one another as he recalls running through the rye fields near his home, the way the stalks rustled in the wind, the smell of hay in summer. This isn’t the first time memories have overwhelmed him, especially recently, but for the first time he’s not left feeling filthy and miserable. He’s strangely refreshed now, even with a new ache in his chest, and he knows exactly what he has to do.

He has limited resources. With no patients or grain samples he’s only got a list of symptoms and a hunch. His time is even more limited, since he guesses that Kirk will take some convincing about this, and he’ll have to catch him at the right time.

First things first.

It takes seven full days. He has to extrapolate a disease based on the reports from Kaelian’s imperial medical headquarters, his knowledge of Kaelian anatomy, and everything he can find out about Kaelian grain. It’s frustrating and exhausting and makes him feel more alive than he has in months. 

Kirk notices. He waits until McCoy is tightly bound, and then sits next to him on the bed, his smile almost amiable. “So, doc, what’s cooking?”

McCoy knows exactly what he means because it’s all he’s been thinking about. His throat goes dry immediately but he tries to cover it with a shrug. “Thought I’d enjoy a little bondage with my pet captain.”

It’s the mouthiest thing he’s ever said, even if he is already naked and tied. Kirk looks comically shocked for half a second before he barks a laugh and slaps McCoy’s exposed ass the way he smacks his shoulder sometimes. Hard. “All right, if that’s the way you want to play. Lucky for you I’m in an awesome mood.”

Kirk is in a good mood, but McCoy still counts the seconds until he can leave. This is necessary, because he can’t tell Kirk about this until it’s done. The only way Kirk will be convinced to do this is if it’s presented to him ready made. He holds onto that until it’s over, and keeps holding on while he stays awake shift after shift to figure out the plague. The answer, when he finally stumbles on it, is shockingly simple, and that above all makes him sure that he’s right. He has to be right.

Chapel comes to see him just as he finishes configuring the antidote. Excited nearly to the point of running around naked and shouting “eureka,” McCoy holds it up. His grin stretches muscles he hasn’t used in ages.

“What is that?” Chapel asks.

“The cure to the Kaelian virus.” He can’t help the pride in his voice. He’s so high on it he feels like he could fix a rainy goddamn day, even if he hasn’t tested the antidote yet. They’ll be time for tests later. He just has to convince Kirk, and he has a week to do it.

Chapel looks unimpressed and annoyed, and not in the grudgingly admiring way she usually does. “You didn’t hear.”

Unease tickles his endorphin rush. “What?”

“That was stupid, doctor,” Chapel snaps. “You knew the standing orders were to ignore the plague. That was the whole point.”

He doesn’t care. Why does she? But he knows, now that he thinks about it, because Kirk had been laughing and malleable and he was only ever like that when he was about to destroy something. “I didn’t hear what?”

Chapel is obviously furious with him, even though he can’t figure out why. Her words are sharp and clipped: “The Captain halved the timeline yesterday. He wants to make an example of them.”

Fuck. _Fuck_. It’s exactly the kind of thing Kirk would do and if McCoy hadn’t been so wrapped up in this stupid fucking planet he would have known that. And now it’s too late, because he can’t let go.

He starts to hoof it out of Sickbay, but pauses when Chapel barks: “McCoy!”

He turns, if only out of shock that she would be so forward.

“You can’t change his mind on this.” There’s something under the anger now, something he’s seen in flashes when she faces Kirk.

He can’t deal with that now. Without bothering to answer, he sprints for the lift and paces as it moves. This has to work. He’s taken hits for everything else, from everyone else, and this is the one thing he actually wants. He can take it, whatever Kirk wants, if only Kirk lets him.

The door swishes open and he all but falls out onto the bridge.

Kirk cocks his head at him. “Look who’s amongst the living. Here for the show?” He grins, gesturing to the view of the doomed planet on the screen.

“I’ve got a cure for the crop disease,” McCoy says breathlessly. If he’d had his druthers he would have brought it up slowly – and in private, that’s for fucking sure – but beggars can’t be choosers. And dammit, he’s ready to beg.

The smile drops from Kirk’s face. “What?” It’s all but an accusation.

“It’s just caused by mold in the grain, like ergot except infected kernels are indistinguishable from healthy ones so consumption is even more likely. It’s completely reversible.”

The surprise is replaced by cool imperial command. It’s not an expression that McCoy associates with getting his way. “Your orders were to consider the case closed, doctor.”

“Captain,” he says, struggling to keep calm. None of the crew are looking at him directly, but this is still nowhere close to private and Kirk’s patience will be proportionately limited. He’s got to be smooth about this, he reminds himself, and ignores the niggling voice telling him that smooth is not his forte. “You don’t have to destroy the city.” 

“It isn’t up to you, McCoy.” The words are clipped, dismissive, but McCoy can’t lose this now. Bad enough to lose a city, even one he’s never seen, but it’s turned into more than that. Kirk has to know that.

“But, Captain, if—”

“I said _no_ , doctor.”

“Dammit, Kirk, _please_ , can’t you just—”

Kirk’s fist slams into his face and he crashes to the floor. Kirk has sent him sprawling before but never so forcefully, and McCoy struggles to swallow blood and the fact that he’s finally crossed the line. It’s almost a relief to finally know where the line is, even as some pathetic, broken part of him wails that it’s not _fair_ , all this work and sacrifice and the one thing he really, finally wants is about to be blown to smithereens.

“Kaeli was given an ultimatum and failed to deliver.” Even staring at his feet McCoy can see that Kirk won’t be moved on this, and that McCoy is going to pay for trying. A week of sleepless nights, of _hoping_ , and this is what it gets him. 

McCoy can feel the excitement of only minutes ago fading, can feel himself slipping into the myopic mess he’d been before Kaeli. Really, he ought to know better by now. Hell, he’d even been warned this would happen. It was only a matter of time. “Aye, Captain.”

He watches Kirk’s feet shift as he straightens into a commanding posture. “Blast it.” 

McCoy slumps on the floor, waiting for the photons to fire, the final blow.

It doesn’t come. The seconds tick by, each more unnerving than the last.

“Is there a problem, Ensign Chekov?”

McCoy looks up at Chekov. He’s staring on the helm, but instead of focusing on it with his usual single-minded intensity he’s fidgeting, biting his lip. He looks younger than usual. “Yes, Captain.”

“Oh?” 

“I seem to be…” Chekov pauses as if struggling for the words. “I – I am unable to program the coordinates for the photon torpedoes, Captain.”

Tense silence has taken the bridge. McCoy never got the details of Chekov’s first assassination attempt, but if it was this ham-handed it’s no wonder he landed in the booth. He prays that Chekov isn’t actually dumb enough to make the same mistake twice. He’s no more capable of killing Kirk than he was before and Kirk is clearly in the mood for blood.

“Lieutenant Sulu, please program the torpedoes and then have Security take Ensign Chekov to the agony booth.” Kirk has reached that soft tone where he forms every word with deadly precision. McCoy can’t help his shiver.

Sulu doesn’t answer immediately either, and looking up McCoy sees he’s frowning at Chekov. He turns to the planet on the screen, and then flicks briefly – and bizarrely – to McCoy. Finally he responds, as mellifluous as ever, “I apologize, Captain, but I’m also finding it impossible to program the torpedoes at this time.”

Both of them? Chekov’s genius and Sulu’s cunning make a much more formidable pair than either of them alone, and Kirk knows it too, from the jump under his jaw. But there’s no hint of it when he speaks. “Lieutenant Uhura, contact the second in command for Security and have these two gentlemen taken away.”

But Uhura’s not looking at the captain either. Her shrewd gaze is focused on Sulu and Chekov, and just as Sulu did she turns to McCoy. But where Sulu had looked away, Uhura continues to stare at him, cold and penetrating and deeply confusing. “I cannot reach Security, Captain.”

What the fuck is going on? First Chekov fumbles through defiance, and now Sulu and Uhura have both jumped on it? McCoy has never seen Sulu and Uhura agree on anything except a fondness for cutting each other, and he could never picture them plotting such a slow, vulnerable attack. It doesn’t have the feel of a planned movement anyway, even to a man with tactician skills as rudimentary as McCoy’s. There’s a communication here that McCoy is missing, and it can’t be good.

Kirk’s coldness has reached Delta Vega levels. “Spock. Do you find yourself _capable_ of handling the task of removing these three?” 

McCoy has no idea what the hell is going on, but he knows it’s got to stop with Spock. Not only is Spock the most loyal ruthless robot he’s ever met, he couldn’t lie if he wanted to.

“I believe I am unable to do that at this time, Captain.”

… Fuck.

He can feel the tension emanating from Kirk. He’s backed into a corner, and McCoy knows there’s nothing more dangerous. Kirk scans the crewmembers, and then stares down at him, like any of this is his idea. “This is mutiny.”

McCoy can’t even bring himself to shake his head, trapped under Kirk’s hard, inhuman gaze. And, really, why should he bother? This kind of concerted refusal to obey orders can only mean one thing, right? And here he is, right in the middle of it because he just can’t keep his nose out of other people’s business.

“With respect, Captain.” Uhura draws his attention quietly, unaccompanied by the sneer she usually sports when she talks to Kirk. “I believe it is merely… gross incompetence on the part of myself, First Officer Spock, Lieutenant Sulu, and Ensign Chekov.” She names them slowly, almost hesitantly. 

Kirk considers that, his fingers ghosting over the trigger of his phaser. McCoy should say something, because he doesn’t get whatever it is that’s going on but he knows for damn sure that it can’t end well. But he’s frozen, because what the hell does he say? All the meager things he’s ever had to offer couldn’t begin to compensate for what Kirk must want now, and Kirk has just made it abundantly clear that it would be stupid to try. His luck has abruptly and violently run out. He waits for Kirk to start shooting.

Kirk says: “If that’s the case, I’ll have to put all of you in the booth.”

There’s silence on the bridge except for the beep and click of equipment. Spock breaks it: “We accept the consequences of our actions, Captain.”

Kirk arches his eyebrows, still looking at McCoy. McCoy can’t look away. “Go on, then,” Kirk orders.

They go. Every one of them marches right off to the booth without a word or a glance backwards.

Kirk is still standing in front of him as replacements for the bridge members file in and take their seats. He inspects them, and after he’s nodded he crouches in front of McCoy. Jesus, fuck, if he thinks McCoy is responsible for this – and fuck, he doesn’t even know what this _is_ \-- he is so fucked nothing in the universe can help him.

… Is that what they thought they were doing?

McCoy flinches as Kirk reaches for his face, but Kirk just holds his chin and runs his thumb along McCoy’s jaw. When he leans in for a kiss McCoy closes his eyes and expects teeth, but there’s only the soft caress of lips. He opens his eyes. Kirk doesn’t look pleased or pissed. “Nicely done, McCoy. I knew there was a reason I liked fucking you.”

He stands up and addresses the bridge: “Tell the Kaelian council that if they don’t have a third of their revenue made up within a month they can look forward to planet wide annihilation.”

Then he’s gone.

McCoy is still sitting on the floor, surrounded by replacement crew, when Chapel finds him. Seeing her shakes off some of the fog and he stands up slowly. They walk in silence to Sickbay until suddenly he remembers. “The antidotes.”

They still have to test them. If they’ve failed, after all this work and the insanity that was the bridge, then he could be looking at an entire bridge crew out for his blood. There would be no assuaging Kirk. High on discovery and the need for immediate action their effectiveness had seemed much more certain. But now…

“Twenty subjects have already been tested, and all showed immediate improvement.”

“What do you mean, already tested?” Kirk couldn’t have sent the comm to Medical more than five minutes ago, probably after pacing the halls and making a few ensigns cry.

Chapel gives him an arch look. “I had them sent down as soon as you made them. There was no shortage of volunteers.”

“But…” She had been sure Kirk wouldn’t approve. The entire thing would have fallen on her shoulders. Between Kirk’s anger and his already fierce dislike for Chapel the booth would have been the least of her worries. “You… why… _thank_ \--”

“Doctor.” Chapel holds up a shushing hand, and continues with the faint condescension of someone explaining a simple concept to a small child, “Don’t mention it.”


End file.
